


ask me no questions (and I won't tell you the truth)

by Sandrine Shaw (Sandrine)



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Future Fic, Getting Together, M/M, Miscommunication, Pining, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Truth Serum, Unintentional Declarations of Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-08-10 16:16:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20138326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandrine/pseuds/Sandrine%20Shaw
Summary: Peter lets his head drop against the backrest of his seat with so much force that the whole chair wobbles. "Oh God, this is such a mess! What if I can never tell a lie again, ever?"





	ask me no questions (and I won't tell you the truth)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pleurer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pleurer/gifts).

> Thanks to my wonderful friend Glitterburn for the beta and the reassurance. ♥ 
> 
> pleurer, I really loved your tags and prompts and hope I could do them justice. Have a great Pining Exchange!

Mr. Stark has that look on his face. 

It's the same look Peter has seen, repeated, since he was a naive fifteen year old who thought being a superhero meant chasing after muggers and thieves and being home in time for dinner with Aunt May. It's a look that says 'you were irresponsible and did something dumb, and now I have to clean up your mess'. 

Peter really, really hates that look. 

He doesn't know when it's worse – when he did something reckless Mr. Stark had warned him not to do and it went wrong, or when his actions were perfectly sensible and justified and whatever bad thing happened really wasn't his fault. Half of the time, he isn't even sure which one is which. 

Mr. Stark pinches his nose and sighs, giving off the whole 'I'm not angry, just disappointed' air that makes Peter want to hang his head and apologize, despite being unsure what he'd be apologizing for. 

"Okay, kid, let's get you checked out."

"There's really no need," Peter protests. "I already went through the decontamination chamber. And I feel fine. Whatever she sprayed me with just smelled like, I don't know? Apples, I think? But that's all, I swear."

"Yeah, well, everyone always says 'I'm fine' until they turn blue or grow a second head or turn into a rabbit, so forgive me if I don't take your word for it." He frowns at Peter and gives him a once-over, like he expects the rabbit ears or the blue fur to materialize any moment now. "In my experience, when a bad guy – well, girl, in this case – uses some kind of chemical toxin on the person who's trying to stop her, the idea behind it is generally not 'I like apples, so I thought everyone should smell fresh and fruity'. So I don't really care that you say you're fine, we're gonna do a full check-up. Come on, let's get this show on the road."

He snaps his fingers impatiently and Peter has to smile despite himself. 

Mr. Stark glares at him. "What?"

"Nothing," Peter says quickly. He has every intention of leaving it at that, wouldn't even know how to verbalize his feelings – except the words spill out of him like water from a fountain before he can even think about it. "It's just... It's super annoying how you still think I'm a dumb kid who needs to be protected, but it's also really sweet that you worry so much, and I kind of like it when you're fussing over me."

Shit.

He... didn't mean to say that. His cheeks are glowing with embarrassment and he can feel Mr. Stark's annoyance melt away into concern, the glare softening and turning alarmed.

Peter winces. "Um. Maybe I'm not that fine?"

At least he's not turning into a two-headed blue rabbit. This can't be worse than that.

*

Three hours later, the idea of transforming into a fluffy blue animal sounds increasingly appealing.

All the tests came back clear, and so did the scans – apart from the MRT of his head that shows a section of his brain being lit up like a Christmas tree. It's concerning to see that, but what's infinitely more concerning is the fact that he absolutely, demonstrably, _horrifically_ cannot tell a lie. Not even a small lie.

'No, Mr. Stark, I didn't skip lunch today'? Nope, not something he can get away with, apparently, despite the fact that he quickly munched down an energy bar before heading out for patrol. 

'Sure, I already studied for the quantum mechanics test on Friday'? Also not words that will leave his lips. 

He can't even lie about stupid stuff that should be open to interpretation, like his favorite color. No matter how many times he thinks _blue blue blue blue_ and how much he visualizes bright blue skies and blueberries and the dress his mom wore when he was four and they went to the zoo together, a rare memory from before the accident, he still blurts out, "Red!"

The frustrated look on his face must be speaking volumes because Mr. Stark sighs. "Not a lie, I assume?"

"Nope." 

Peter lets his head drop against the backrest of his seat with so much force that the whole chair wobbles. Maybe if he tumbles down and hits his head hard enough, he'll go back to normal. Or maybe he'll just have a concussion and still be stuck being compelled to tell the truth. Panic wells up inside him at the idea. "Oh God, this is such a mess! What if I can never tell a lie again, ever?"

Mr. Stark huffs and pats his shoulder. "Relax. As long as no one's outright asking if you're Spider-Man, you'll be fine. Well, unless they want to know what you did this morning. Or last weekend. On second thoughts, maybe you should stay here until we fix you."

There are worse questions he could face than being prompted to uncover his secret identity, Peter thinks. If people find out that he's the one under the Spider-Man mask, it'll suck because it will take away the veneer of safety he has when he's just Peter Parker. But ever since Titan, that veneer's been brittle and frail anyway. Having his identity revealed to the world won't ruin anything important in his life. He doesn't have the same faith about some of his other secrets.

He swallows against the lump in his throat and shoves that unpleasant thought with all its scary implications away as firmly as he can. "Maybe it'll just fade eventually?" 

It seems like a reasonable hope. Toxins commonly wear off once they’ve burned through the system of the person they've been affecting (well, unless they kill the person, and wow, that's really not an option Peter wants to consider). Maybe all Peter needs to do is wait it out.

Mr. Stark's eyes dart to the screen that shows his brain scan in all the weird colors. 

"Sure, yeah, maybe that happens," he says, in a tone that suggests that he absolutely doesn't think it's going to happen, at least not anytime soon.

*

It's 10:36 in the evening and they've been at the lab for seven hours when Peter finally puts his foot down and demands that they take a break for the day.

"Look, Mr. Stark, I'm starting to feel a bit like some kind of lab rat you're experimenting on," he says, just as Mr. Stark is about to take another vial or six of his blood. 

At the stricken look he receives in return, Peter feels a stab of guilt and quickly backpedals because he doesn't want to make Mr. Stark feel bad – of course he doesn't – he just wants them to stop going round and round in circles and running the fifty-eighth test that almost certainly won’t render a different result than the fifty-seven that came before. "I'm sorry, I know you're doing what you can to help, but we're not getting anywhere tonight and I really need a break."

Mr. Stark puts down the syringe and sighs, rubbing his forehead. 

"You're right. Of course you're right," he concedes, too fast. He's usually not that quick to admit when he's been wrong, and even though Peter sometimes rolls his eyes at that infamous stubbornness (secretly, when he's sure Mr. Stark won't see him do it), the sudden absence of it is a whole new level of alarming. "I'm sorry. We'll get in touch with Banner tomorrow, see if he has an idea, and maybe Strange, if we really have to. Do you want to eat something? Or maybe watch a movie? Or I can drop you off at home for the night if you want me to and get you again first thing in the morning, make sure you don't run into anyone who's gonna ask you awkward questions."

He looks as tired as Peter feels, the lines of his face more pronounced than usual and frustration written all over every tense muscle. Peter wants to reach out and touch, smooth them out, press close until the tension bleeds away, but he knows it doesn't work like that. 

As much as he wants things to be that easy, they never are. 

"No, it's okay. I'll just sleep in my room here and then tomorrow we'll try something else. Don't worry, Mr. Stark, it's gonna be fine. We've been through way worse stuff and things have always worked out."

The words are meant to provide some comfort, but they seem to have the opposite effect, if the downward slant of Mr. Stark's mouth is anything to go by. 

"Your optimism is endearing, kid, but we both know it's not true. Overall, our success rate— well, let's be real, _my_ success rate— has been more than a little spotty."

The bitterness bleeding through makes Peter ache in an almost physical way, a tightness underneath his ribcage like someone is squeezing his heart and his lungs with an iron fist. 

"We're still here, though," he says, fiercely and clumsily arguing against the wall of guilt Mr. Stark has piled up around himself. That guilt's nothing new; Peter has seen it before, keeps catching glimpses of it during Avengers missions or during debriefings, but it's not usually quite this obvious, not quite this close to the surface, and it speaks of Mr. Stark's tiredness that he's laying it out so clearly for Peter to see rather than trying to hide it behind false optimism and grim determination. "The world's still here. _I'm_ still here, and I know for a fact that I wouldn't be if it hadn't been for you. I wish you'd —"

He cuts himself off just in time before he can get any more obvious, embarrassing himself – and Mr. Stark – any further, but it costs actual effort to hold his feelings in. 

It shouldn't. 

He has so much experience of not spilling his emotions all over Mr. Stark, years’ worth of being just the acceptable amount of excitable and appreciative, expressing his reverence in a way that's appropriate for a mentor, and a colleague, and maybe – hopefully – a friend. And suddenly it's almost impossible to hold back. 

Peter recognizes the impulse as something foreign and artificial, even though the emotions behind it aren't. A compulsion to tell the truth, unprompted, that he finds hard to deny and— no, this cannot be happening. 

He blanches and stares at Mr. Stark, who of course has noticed that something's amiss and is frowning at him, and Peter knows the '_What's wrong?_' is coming and knows he won't be able to hold back once the question is asked. He shakes his head frantically. 

"I'm sorry. I need to— I gotta go. I can't— Sorry!" 

He's out of the door before Mr. Stark has the chance to ask a perfectly harmless question that might well ruin one of the most important relationships in Peter's life.

*

His room in the Tower has always felt like home, designed and decorated to resemble his bedroom at Aunt May's house with the intention of making it a familiar space of retreat. It's cluttered and messy in a way Peter is sure offends Mr. Stark’s aesthetic sensibilities and yet no one ever tries to tidy it up, not beyond a regular and thorough, but startlingly non-invasive cleaning that leaves all his belongings untouched.

Tonight, though, for the first time, he lies on the ridiculously comfortable bed, staring at the ceiling and feeling the need to get out of here burn under his skin. He wants nothing more than to grab his spare suit from the closet, open the window and swing his way out of here, as far away from where Mr. Stark can find him as possible. 

It's stupid, of course. As long as the truth serum is in his system, he shouldn't be among people, neither as Peter Parker nor as Spider-Man. No matter what his instincts tell him, in here he's safe from everything except embarrassment and heartbreak.

It takes almost twenty minutes until the knock on his door comes, like Peter knew it would.

_Please go away_, he thinks, but his stupid, impulsive subconscious apparently didn't get the message and doesn't understand that wanting something doesn't necessary mean you should make a play for it, because when Peter opens his mouths, what he actually says is, "Come in."

The door opens and Mr. Stark steps into the room, tentative, like he's hesitant to infringe on Peter's self-imposed exile. 

He puts his hands in his pockets, eyeing Peter warily. "Alright, kid, I'm not going to ask, because obviously you don't want to talk about it and it would be unfair to make you. But if it's anything related to what's happening to you right now, I kind of need to know what's going on if we want to counteract the toxin at some point in the near future."

And— yeah, that's fair. Peter concentrates hard on the kind of information that directly relates to the toxin and its effect rather than... everything else, all the inconvenient, uncomfortable, mortifying truths he feels physically prompted to spill.

"It's getting worse. It makes me want to say... things."

Mr. Stark scoffs at him. "Oh, that's very precise. What kind— No, let me rephrase that. How do you mean, it's getting worse?"

Grateful for the redirection, for being asked something precise and professional that has nothing to do with his emotional turmoil, Peter sits up and turns towards Mr. Stark, running a shaky hand through his hair. "At the beginning, it was only affecting me when I was asked a direct question, but now— It's like always there now, making me want to talk. Even when you don't ask me anything, I can barely stop myself from telling you stuff that's on my mind."

"So, what, you're feeling the need to talk my ear off about how red's your favorite color and other random little tidbits of information? I think I can deal with a little oversharing. And you don't have to worry, it's just you and me here."

It almost makes Peter laugh, that 'don't worry', like Mr. Stark didn't just single out the part that made him worry the most. 

"Yeah, that's the problem," he can't stop himself from saying. He winces. _Shit_. This conversation was going so well. He hides his face in his palms. 

Silence stretches awkwardly between them, each passing second making Peter's gut clench harder. 

"Kid," Mr. Stark finally says, tone deliberately careful in a way Peter hates. "There's absolutely nothing you could tell me that would make me think less of you."

Peter peeks out from between his fingers. Mr. Stark is frowning, like the concept of Peter revealing anything that might make him see him differently is completely foreign and impossible to him.

"You don't know that."

"I do." The response is prompt, full of confidence that leaves no room for argument.

That unshakable faith in him makes Peter's heart clench with happiness as much as it makes him want to cry. 

He clamps down on the 'I love you' that desperately wants to be said, the words burning on his tongue when he tries to swallow them back down. What he does say, eventually, when he can't stop himself anymore, isn't much better – or much less incriminating. "I know you mean it, Mr. Stark, but you can't promise me that. And it would break my heart to lose this, to lose you. I can't do that again. Those seven months when you were gone... that was the worst time of my life."

The expression on Mr. Stark's face is one that burns itself into Peter's mind like acid. 

"Pete, that's not true," he says with too much conviction, and it feels like Peter's been hanging by a single string that's been cut. He's up on his feet and right in front of Mr. Stark before he can think about what he's doing.

"What part of _I cannot tell a lie_ don't you get?" He almost bites his tongue after the sharp words tumble out, instinctively regretting the harshness of his tone. He doesn't talk like that to Mr. Stark. Except, maybe, it's time that he does. "Look, I get it. You think I'm just a stupid kid who has a stupid crush on you. And that's —" 

_That's okay_, he wants to say, but he's physically unable to get the words out, no matter how hard he tries. 

"I can deal with that," he amends. Because he can do that. He _has been_ dealing with it for a while now, and he would have continued to silently deal with it if it hadn't been for the unexpected dose of apple-scented truth serum. "But don't act like you don't deserve to be loved."

And there it is, the big admission, the one thing Peter wasn't going to say, larger than life in the small room, filling up the space between them until there's barely enough air left to breathe.

"I don't think you're a stupid kid," Mr. Stark says, because of course he's focusing on that. That was the easy part. "I think you're amazing, and smart, and you shouldn't —" 

He stops himself mid-sentence, reaching out and clasping Peter's shoulder the same way he's done a million times before. Except this time the comforting touch feels condescending instead of reassuring. Peter flinches. 

"Look, it's late and you're upset. Why don't we table this conversation until we've dealt with whatever's in your system so you aren't forced to be more honest than you want to be." He might as well be saying '— so you aren't forced to be more honest than _I_ want you to be', because it's fairly obvious that this is what he really means. 

Peter looks away, his eyes feeling red and sore. 

"Sure, yeah, of course." What else is there to say? He forces his mouth into an unsteady smile that's as much of a lie as his body is capable of right now. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to unload all of this on you."

Mr. Stark gives his shoulder another squeeze. "You have absolutely nothing to be sorry for, kid." 

Unlike Peter, Mr. Stark clearly has no problem telling a lie.

*

When he wakes in the morning, his head aches worse than the day after that first freshman party where he only realized that the punch was spiked once he drank about five glasses of it. Through the large windows, sunlight streams into the room, painfully bright, and far down on the ground, the Manhattan morning traffic looks minuscule and unreal.

Unlike when he was dealing with the hangover, Peter still remembers last night with agonizing clarity: every embarrassing thing he said, every unwanted admission, the pity on Mr. Stark's face. 

"I'm fine," he tells the mirror in the ensuite bathroom, and there's nothing stopping the lie from coming over his lips.

Well, at least that's that. The validation over having been right about the toxin burning itself out of his system is overshadowed by resentment that it couldn't have happened before he went and wrecked one of the best things in his life.

He quickly scribbles a note for Mr. Stark to let him know the situation solved itself, no need to get Dr. Banner involved, and he'll talk to him later. He could easily have sent a text instead or just had F.R.I.D.A.Y. relay the message, but that would give Mr. Stark time to react before Peter leaves and he doesn't think he can handle that conversation right now. 

He tries to think of something he could add to the note, anything that would make it better, but there's nothing. He can't unsay what he said, can't turn back the time or make Mr. Stark forget what Peter told him. 

_I'm sorry_, he writes. 

Then he puts on his spare suit and swings out of the window.

*

He's on his evening patrol when Karen lets him know that Iron Man is nearby.

As much as Peter would like to just zip away as quick as he can and test if he can outrun – well, more like, outweb? – Iron Man (unlikely, but worth a try), he knows it would be immature and petty.

Swinging up onto the roof of one of the old brownstones in Brooklyn, he waits until Mr. Stark lands in front of him in a flash of gold and red, Peter's heart beating a hundred miles per minute as he watches the Iron Man suit open up and Mr. Stark step out. His hair is mussed up and if possible he looks even more tired than he did last night, like he didn't get any sleep at all. _My fault_, Peter thinks. And yet, beneath the gloves, his fingers itch with the urge to reach out and touch, because even knowing that he'd just make things worse, he can't help _wanting_.

"Can we talk?" Mr. Stark asks.

It feels silly standing there with the Spider-Man mask on when he's talking to Tony Stark rather than Iron Man. Peter pulls it off, and instantly regrets it because it makes him feel open and vulnerable in a way he last felt when Ned and May sat him down for an intervention, five months after the funeral. 

The memory echoes the sense of loss he felt, the overwhelming grief. Compared to that, this is nothing, he tells himself. Mr. Stark is alive and well. They both are. Everything else... You can't lose what was never yours to begin with.

He puts on a brave smile. It's brittle, but it's a smile nevertheless. "I kind of think I already talked too much."

"You didn't say anything I didn't know."

And that's— Well, it's not entirely surprising, because Mr. Stark's smart and Peter always wears his heart on his sleeve, but at the same time, it still startles him. Peter didn't ever really consider the possibility that maybe Mr. Stark actually _knew_, the whole time. He supposes that makes it better, or at least less likely that Mr. Stark will expel Peter from his life for having inappropriate feelings.

"At least you used to have plausible deniability." 

Looking Mr. Stark in the eye gets a little too much, so Peter turns his head. Somewhere in the distance, police sirens sound, making him wonder if he could get away with begging off to stop a mugging or apprehend some kind of thug on the run.

"Maybe. Or maybe I was just being a coward." 

Peter's head snaps back around at the blunt words. "Oh no, Mr. Stark, I would never—" he begins, but Mr. Stark holds up a hand to forestall the protest and cuts him off. 

"Look, you accused me of thinking I don't deserve to be loved, but that's not it. Or maybe it is, but mostly it's that you could do... so much better than me. And I'm — _terrified_ that one day I'll mess up – because let's face it, of course I'll mess up; it's kind of my thing – and you'll realize that, and then I'll lose you. Again. And I couldn't handle that. Because if you think those few months when I was dead were bad, I promise you, it was nothing compared to five years without you. I watched you fall to dust right in front of me, kid. Trust me, even if I didn't have a long history of abandonment issues, that moment alone would have given me enough of those to throw a couple million dollars at therapists for the next few decades."

Part of Peter – the part that tried therapy once but eventually gave up because what's the point if you can't talk about your secret identity and how you watched your superhero mentor who you're in love with sacrifice himself to save the world so you have to blame all your issues on your dead parents instead – wants to ask if the expensive therapists are helping. But he figures it's more likely that it was just a joke, because he can't really see Mr. Stark opening up about his trauma to a random stranger, even if that stranger was paid for their silence. 

He understands the kind of fear Mr. Stark is talking about, and the fact that he admits it to Peter is touching, but from where Peter is standing, it seems a silly thing to worry about. 

"You won't lose me. I don't care how much you mess up – not that I really think you're messing up. You won't get rid of me that easily, not unless you want to. It doesn't matter that you don't feel the same way as I do. It's okay." That last part's still a lie, but it's a small one that's easily forgivable as long as it offers some reassurance and makes Mr. Stark feel better, Peter thinks. There has to be an advantage of not being high on truth serum anymore.

Mr. Stark scoffs. 

"You're not listening to what I'm saying," he says, and Peter has an automatic _I'm always listening to you_ rebuke on his tongue ready to come out, but it dies on his lips when Mr. Stark's hand settles on the side of his neck, large and warm and not quite steady. And maybe that – the lack of resolution, that glimpse of insecurity – is why it feels different from the way Mr. Stark clasped his shoulder last night. His thumb rests against Peter's cheek, and there's an intimacy to the touch that sets the fluttery sense of butterflies loose in Peter's stomach.

And then Mr. Stark kisses him, and Peter's brain short-circuits. 

As kisses go, it's nothing special. It's fairly chaste and light and it doesn't last long enough for Peter to press for more. But it's _Mr. Stark_, who Peter has been in love with since he was seventeen. Who he couldn't let go of even after he was dead and gone for half a year. Who he never thought would ever see anything in him but the teenage wannabe superhero in need of a baby monitor protocol.

But here they are, a good decade later (and okay, Peter's been kind of dead for half that time), and Mr. Stark is kissing him like he means it, like Peter's something important he can’t bear to let go. 

When he pulls back, his hand remains where it is, curved along Peter's neck.

"Oh." Peter wets his dry lips, still tingling from the kiss and the sensation of Mr. Stark's beard rubbing against the tender skin. _Tony_, he quietly thinks; Peter should really think of him as Tony if they're doing this, at least inside his head, even if he feels kind of reluctant to retire the _Mr. Stark_. He feels dazed, and high on happiness that he still can't quite believe is real. "Are you— You are? Really? Why didn't you say something yesterday? I thought I had ruined everything."

There's a note of accusation in his voice that almost makes him apologize, but fuck that, Tony deserves it after the way he left Peter last night.

Tony rolls his eyes at him, but his fingers briefly squeeze the back of Peter's neck in an almost-apology. "Pete, you were drugged and vulnerable and unable to control what you were willing to tell me. I wasn't going to take advantage of that. And I kind of thought that you understood that I was saying 'not like this' and not 'not ever'." He levels a wry smile at Peter. "See, already messing things up."

"I think we need to work on our communication skills," Peter says. "And by 'we', I mostly mean ‘you’."

Though, yeah, maybe they could have been kissing a lot earlier if Peter hadn't been so ready to write this off as a hopeless case, so maybe it's not one hundred percent Tony's fault. It's not like Peter has such a stellar history of actually talking about his feelings either. 

"Noted," Tony says. "If you want to, we can—"

Then again, they can always do the conversation thing later, Peter decides, leaning in and cutting off whatever Tony was about to say with another kiss that carries a decade's worth of pent-up longing and frustration, all the wanting and the desperation bottled up when Peter thought he'd never get to have this.

It's intense, and amazing, and more honest than anything a truth serum could ever make him admit.

End.


End file.
